


Take the Last Page

by Iambic



Category: Petshop of Horrors
Genre: Gen, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-01-01
Updated: 2009-01-01
Packaged: 2017-10-04 13:47:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Iambic/pseuds/Iambic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An exchange that never happened, and probably wouldn't have changed a thing. Spoilers for the end of the series.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Take the Last Page

There are some who say that for every choice that is made, there is another dimension in which the opposite path is taken, that history grows like a tree, in branches. Scientists and mathematicians refer to fractals, or quantum theory; a wise and clever author calls this concept the 'Trousers of Time'. Whichever the name, the theory remains the same.

This is not what happened on a seemingly ordinary day in Los Angeles, California, in a small pet shop in Chinatown.

But somewhere else, it happened all the same.

\--

"Orcot. I'm on my way."

Count D could not say in all honesty that Leon's prioritising particularly surprised him. Even his typically American lack of decorum no longer troubled the Count; Leon had his ways and stuck to them. Something was troubling him, and D had a feeling he knew what it was. Which was why he had pretended that today was a normal day, that they would have tea and bicker like normal until Leon eventually left for work. This would not even happen, it seemed, for Chris' sudden departure with his brother's knowledge most likely still rankled in the detective's memory. And then the government man shed his shadow over everything.

Nonetheless, D protested, "But I've just finished baking the most delicious muffins." Act normal, act natural. Leon would never know – at least, not until it was far too late. As expected, the detective didn't even turn around to acknowledge the fact that D had spoken to him. Incurably American as ever, D thought disdainfully.

That would have been it. That should have been it. Leon would have left in anger, D would have remembered him for all his faults, and they all would have got on with their respective lives. But some part of him, the same part that had been inexplicably fond of Chris, that had felt distant regret for the pointless deaths of those who got in the way of prices, that had somehow managed to foster attachments in all the wrong places – that small part of him rebelled. Before he quite knew what he was doing, he had spoken again.

"Mr Detective?"

Leon didn't turn around, but he paused at the door, which was good enough. (Good enough? D thought wildly. How was that good?) "Mm?" he responded. Typically.

"No," D said. "It's…"

Nothing, he would have finished. He really would have. But memory, D knew, had the terrible tendency to resurface at the worst possible times, and he recalled then the last time he had said something similarly misleading. When the girl Monica died in that plane crash, and D had felt only relief that her cycle of futile reincarnation had ended. At first he hadn't understood the shock and disgust in Leon's expression then, but D knew humans well enough to piece it together.

He didn't owe Leon anything, and certainly not an explanation. It didn't matter if Leon no longer saw him as human – he _wasn't_ human. And he would be leaving soon, before the government man could meddle in things he didn't understand. This was his father's legacy, D's cross to bear for him. And he had made the same mistake with Leon.

But there was one thing he could do, that his father hadn't. Maybe it would make all the difference. Maybe it would prove to D what he'd known all along: that Leon, being human, was invariably the enemy.

"This is the last time you will see me," D said, maintaining his best shopkeeper's smile. "My work here is done. Say what goodbyes you wish, and close the door on your way out."

He waited for Leon to pull out his radio and call for backup, or pull out his gun and tell D he wasn't going anywhere. Either measure would have been pointless; D could easily have dealt with Leon and escaped long before anyone else turned up. But Leon didn't do either of these things. He turned around, very slowly, staring down the stairs at D as if seeing him for the first time.

Then he ran down the stairs and punched D in the face, striking out in what D supposed was understandable anger. The blow hurt, of course – Leon trained for combat with men twice his size – but D was too busy being surprised by the, well, animal nature of this course of action.

His grandfather had always insisted that humans, though evil, were simply animals themselves. D had never been more certain of this than he was now, fallen back on the floor, looking up at the blind rage not yet faded from Leon's face.

"You son of a bitch," Leon snarled. "I'm not gonna close the goddamned door just because you say so!"

There was something so wonderfully, horribly metaphoric here, that the one thing Leon really exploded over was the simple request to shut the door. Later, perhaps, D would think more on this. But right now, while he had the chance, he had to help Leon find some sort of closure – so that D wouldn't have yet another man tracking him across the country.

Besides, Leon wasn't a bad man. At least, he kept to his own beliefs and acted in his own interest, without ulterior motive, a trait that most humans lacked. And D would be lying if he said he wasn't fond of the detective in that way which enemies, if in the same place long enough, would become friends. Not that this mattered in the end. Leon would get his closure, and then D would leave before the government man found him, and the world would continue to turn.

"I was right about you," D said with a smile. "You're just an animal yourself, Detective."

"Yeah, well, I'd rather be an animal than a manipulative bastard who sells them," Leon told him. "Rules of the jungle, I can at least understand."

D stood, slowly. "You're fortunate that I am not like you," he continued. "Or else I would have had to strike back."

"You're the lucky one," Leon retorted. "Or maybe you're just smart." He looked to the door and back, and D knew at once what sort of internalised debate had to be going on inside the detective's head. Do as he'd been told to, and go to wherever he'd been called? Or stay here and interrogate D one last time? D could almost see the arguments laid out in Leon's head, and he had a feeling he knew what would happen.

"So what now, you're running away?" Leon was demanding, and D very nearly dropped the distant shopkeeper persona in the instinctive denial. But he didn't; he knew better than to actually let Leon get to him.

"Thank you for the pastries," D said instead of answering the question.

Leon stared him down for a minute, as if under the delusion that he could crack the mask if he tried hard enough. D simply smiled as enigmatically as he knew how, until Leon broke the staredown and turned away.

"Sure thing," he muttered heading back to the door. He paused again there, turned back. D steeled himself, so as not to say another word, not to drop the act until Leon was well away.

Neither of them said another word, and eventually Leon walked out the door for the last time that D would witness. D waited a few more moments, to be sure it was safe, and then slowly relaxed, returned to his previous seated position. A few of the pets draped arms and heads over the rest of the chair, and his legs and shoulders.

"I'm all right," he told them. "Just tired of this city. That's all."


End file.
